The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), which has been organizing an annual ‘Partnership Summit’ for the past 20 years in association with the Union Ministry of Commerce and Industry, chose the city of Jaipur in Rajasthan to host this year’s international gathering of investors.

Saulat Ali Khan, Managing Director for the Executive Board of Protiviti, a global business consulting firm, along with several other business dignitaries attended this year’s summit. Mr. Khan, who has been working in Kuwait for over 40 years, recently moved back to the main office of Protiviti in Gurgaon, India.

Giving his overview of this year’s Summit, Mr. Khan said that it when the CII people invited him to take part in the summit and he read about the important topics that would be discussed at the summit he was very excited and decided to attend the three day summit.

The summit provided an opportunity for attendees to interact with policy makers, investors, industry leaders, trade bodies and associations and entrepreneurs from India and abroad. It was also a unique platform that brought together political, business, academia and other stakeholders to promote investments and development in India, with emphasis on the state of Rajasthan.

A plenary session titled ‘Defining Shared Realities’, held on the sidelines of the summit emphasized the need for the world to develop new strategies and partnerships to lift global growth and support global rebalancing.

A special session held under the auspices of the World Trade Organization (WTO) called for a strong, vibrant, predictable and rules-based multilateral trading system, which is in the interest of all countries, particularly developing countries. The panel discussed how the WTO can be made more responsive to development needs of emerging and developing economies in particular. It also explored how the WTO could respond in future to the ever expanding list of issues, including the proliferation of free trade agreements and rising non-tariff barriers.

The summit, which was held under the patronage of the Chief Minister of Rajasthan, Vasundhara Raje, also saw the attendance of Union minister of Railways, Suresh Prabhu and the Commerce and Industry minister Nirmala Sitharaman. The summit also had the participation by the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Commerce and Industry of Kuwait, Abdulmohsen Medij Al Medij, who represented Kuwait at the summit.

In an official dinner organized by the chief minister in the evening, we were able to discuss in detail on several important topics, said Mr. Khan. Protiviti, which has branches in Gurgaon, Hyderabad and Bangalore, now plans to open a new office in Jaipur. “Whatever I have heard about the Pink City has been encouraging and I see plenty of potential for vestments and development in Rajasthan,” said Mr. Khan.

He added, “The great thing about Jaipur is that it has a very good and consistent power supply that never goes out. Moreover, the government and administration in Rajasthan is committed to doing everything possible to encourage business and development in the state.”

Mr. Khan also met Rajat Sharma, host of popular TV show ‘Aap ki Adalat’, who was recently awarded Padma Shree by the government, and invited him to bring his show to Kuwait.

In conclusion, Mr. Khan said that he was very much impressed with his visit, as he got the chance to meet, greet and discuss topics of interest with a lot of important people under one roof.